


Last Dance

by agoodwoman



Series: Instinct Over Reason [14]
Category: The X-Files RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-08 18:08:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15248985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agoodwoman/pseuds/agoodwoman
Summary: October, Orlando, it's sticky and they meet for dinner.





	1. Chapter 1

The air was sticky for October but then again, it was Florida. The thick moisture settled on her face and clung to the hair on her arms. She felt her T-shirt stick to the skin on her back the moment she landed. As she crossed the airport with the forced air on almost too cold, she wondered why anyone would choose to live in a state that caught on fire while being surrounded with water on three sides.

The truth was she wasn’t happy to be there. He called her in the middle of the night (for him) and made a drunken promise to be a solo attendee. She bit back a comment about hiring a babysitter so that the conversation could remain as neutral as possible while he was inebriated because even though he wasn’t fully lucid, it was nice just to hear his voice again.

“I’ll come without the _entourage_ ,” he promised with a gravelly monotone that went straight to her belly. “I’ll even do the whole thing sober this time.”

He was referring to Chicago when they did a convention with Mitch and William B. Davis. David had eaten an edible before arriving at the panel in the same clothes he put on after spending a night in her bed. He didn’t even shower that morning to rinse the odour of sex off his body. That rebellious act caused her to force him to sit next to her on the small couch to prevent anyone else from picking up the obvious scent of a man who had fucked her four times less than twelve hours ago.

The sound of his voice through the phone caught her off guard by falling into an old habit of missing the way he made her feel just by speaking on the phone. It was a chance to meet up and be around each other without the cliched sidekicks they both picked up in the last two years.

Objectively, as she felt her hip bones rub against the material on her jeans and she tugged on the waist to keep them up, she could recognize that neither of them were living their best lives right now.

This wouldn’t be the first time they had a fall from grace and used each other as a crutch. To get away with it with her moral code, she rationalized that she needed to get him out of her system so she could go back to focusing on her career. Things had been going well for her, professionally. She had done more mainstream movie projects. She was being seen as more than just “Scully from the X-Files” and he was… well, David turned into the same guy who had almost lost everything over a decade before. Now he had a fraction of that and the man was playing it fast and loose with his reputation. Not many actors are able to turn their reputations around after a sex addiction scandal and going to rehab for what was looked at as a perversion while working on a sex-centred show but he had managed to do so endearingly. He won back those who called him names and proved to everyone he was more than a one trick pony actor with the monotone written in the 90s about by a fresh faced, guitar playing teen.

It took a lot for her to ignore who he was spending his downtime with these days. It was too depressing to look in the mirror and see the age lines on her face, knowing he was taking a woman half her age around the world. He brought her on his music tour and followed it up with a getaway to a romantic spot that Gillian had googled for her and David to meet at.

David and Gillian never made it to Australia at the same time. Her schedule changed, his daughter asked him to come to Dartmouth and fate worked against them for the last time. It became too hard to deal with his obvious disappointment while she tried to mask her insecurities over their constant battles to meet up.

It was exhausting enough trying to portray someone who was self-assured and happy in her single life while hiding that she was miserable in a secret romance. Her romantic life had become more public but the problem with being public were the questions about why she was his plus one constantly to why she wasn’t his plus one constantly.

Either way, people wanted to know more than they were entitled to and it exhausted her.

So what the fuck was she doing there?

Why did she need to spend another weekend signing her name a booth away from him and sit at a panel where people asked them the same questions about aliens and lack of sex. One, she believed in aliens and two, their showrunner was a prude.

She sure as shit hoped there were aliens out there. This world was going to hell and it was far too depressing to think of humanity as being the only ones around to make it good again.

Now she sounded more like Mulder than Scully but that was the point of acting. To be someone else and escape who she was.

She enjoyed slipping into a costume and looking in the mirror to see someone else looking back at her. She appreciated the escape it provided from the harsh realities of the world.

Going to a convention as someone else would be far more interesting as an exercise in improv than going as herself and facing the reality that people were left feeling like she was. The truth was the show could have done more with the character’s love lives. Fans seemed equally vocal in sharing that view or that they were tired of the show altogether. Gillian surmised those viewers didn’t care if Scully had a desk either.

Those viewers were called misogynists but you couldn’t say that to their faces with a blaring light on the stage and a microphone in hand. It would become a sound bite where a privileged white actress, who was being paid a stupid amount of money for attending, lectured out inequality to someone who paid an arm and a leg just to be there.

She was standing in a Golden Oak View suite at the Orlando Four Seasons with the peach, cream, grey decor littering the space. The modern pieces, the fresh white roses and the welcome basket on the table by the balcony in the living room reminded her why.

The bellhop left her bag in the closet and she thanked the young man with a tip. The moment the door clicked shut, she rounded the corner to the bedroom, stepped out of her shoes and fell onto the plush bedding for a hopeful nap before she went to dinner.

These things always took a lot out of her and truth be told, she wasn’t sure what to expect this time around with David being there. In Chicago, she had planned a visit with family and an early night. What she got instead was a night of loud, rough and tender sex that left her sore for three days in the ways she had craved since their last night together in New York.

This time she wasn’t sure what to expect. Most of her gut feeling about this trip was anger and annoyance towards him. There was an overwhelming distaste for who he had become but it probably stemmed from not liking herself much these days either.

A lot had changed for them in twenty-five years. The man he was now wasn’t the same as the man she met on a Fox lot in 1993.

Maybe he was the same and that’s why she had that familiar feeling that she didn’t like him very much.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she reached into her leather jacket to pull the device out. His name came across the screen with four emojis. A peach, a mouth with a tongue, an eggplant and water splash.

Gillian took a deep breath and let it out slowly through her nose. She swiped her thumb right across the notification and the screen expanded to a bigger text. Three lines underneath he typed, “Now that I have your attention - do you feel like getting some room service?”

Her thumbs paused over the screen as she ran through a hundred replies. She was more careful these days about how she responded to everyone and he was no different. Everything was calculated and careful.

“Why don’t we meet at the hotel restaurant?” she suggested as an alternative.

Her usual M.O. was to hold out on the urge to slip into his bed and old patterns as long as she could. She was better at flirting, getting his desires going and pulling back as many times as she could until the most basic side of her prevailed as her thighs spread to his body and he entered her.

This wouldn’t be one of those times. Definitely not. No one could say she planned to bed him when she made her travel arrangements. She came alone because she needed a break from the noise of her house and the man she had been attached to the last two years.

In honesty, the work over the last year should have given her that respite but it never felt like enough. She longed for a time when she didn’t have to force a laugh and wonder how he couldn’t see her acting through a smile. This would be a seventy-two-hour respite from falsities until someone asked her yet another question about an element of the show she couldn’t control or an element she could but wanted to call ignorance on.

“I’m hungry now,” he typed back.

“I just got in,” she replied. “I’ll meet you at the restaurant downstairs if you can’t wait.”

Every time news broke about a celebrity who suffered from their privacy being violated because of a phone hack, she thanked her luck that no one was interested in her life that much.

Even still, it felt like nothing was a secret anymore and there was a time when she used to dread an email from her manager about another gossip item about her when she wanted people to focus on her work. These days, she wasn’t being talked about much at all unless it was her work and she appreciated the quiet from the onslaught that occurred after she stepped out the first time with Peter.

She worried by thinking about him, it might prompt a phone call. Those check-in conversations had become tedious and she wondered if she could ever not feel like a relationship was a chore she performed.

Once, she recalled David telling her that marriage was a lot of work.

“There was a six month period I called in sick instead of giving it any effort,” he told her as he drew lazy patterns on her bare back underneath the strands of her long red hair.

“What’s _this_?” she asked as she glanced between their naked bodies and his twitching member indicated they could go again shortly.

“ _Paid vacation_ ,” he replied with a grin.

Their families weren’t set to come in for another few days and they had the freedom of using each other to familiarize themselves with their characters again and fuck each other endlessly in a hot room with the cold winter of Canada outside.

If she decided to live regret, she might choose to point out that those weren’t the times they were honouring the other people in their relationships. That’s what was hard about being with one person so publicly. Every misstep that made its way out into the open hurt them because you couldn’t control your urges around someone who excited and infuriated you at the same time.

A knock sounded at her door and she groaned as she slowly made her way off the bed. She liked the feeling of the expensive carpeting under her bare feet and whoever was at the door would have to adjust to looking down at her. When she pulled the door open, it surprised her to see her former costar standing on the other side.

“Hi,” she said with a hint of surprise in her voice she immediately regretted.

David had two day’s worth of growth on his face and was wearing a red, well-worn soft cotton shirt, jeans that hugged his hips in all the right places and a pair of converse sneakers. A pair of aviator sunglasses hung from his collar and he wore a grey canvas jacket overtop. Five years ago, this look would have made her belly flip.

Today, a small twinge hit her in her jeans and she shook it away as soon as it came.

“Ready?” he asked her and she narrowed her eyes. “ _No_?”

“I just got here,” she replied.

David nodded. “I can wait while you do your… thing.”

He knew her well enough to know she liked to wash her face and change her clothes after she landed from a long flight. He knew a few too many other things about her too but she was trying not to think of that right now.

Gillian sighed heavily as she contemplated what to tell him. She was an adult and could occupy a small, private space without falling back into her old patterns. There were times in their history where she didn’t give in to the basic urges of her body needing his. Those times were hard on them especially but she was capable of not sleeping with him.

“Thank you,” she said and stepped back from the room door.

The door closed quietly and she watched as he moved across the hotel room to stand in her living room.

“I like the suite,” he commented.

“Where are you?” she asked more out of civility than curiosity.

“Just in a room,” he answered. “Like half this size? I don’t know, it’s smaller than my Vancouver apartment but bigger than a bread box.”

“That apartment wasn’t so small,” she replied automatically and regretted reminding him of her familiarity with it.

“It’s just me here so I don’t need a separate space to entertain,” he said as he glanced around the living room.

“I’m here alone too,” she retorted defensively.

David stared out the window past the balcony and then moved towards the bedroom. She make a small squeak of protest as he passed by her and the walk-in closet before entering her bedroom. He sighed as he laid back on her bed and made himself comfortable on the space she had just exited.

“This smells like you already,” he commented as he pulled the pillow under his head and then took a long breath. “Sort of... Wait, are you using a new shampoo?”

“No… that’s…” she shook her head. “It’s my dry shampoo I use when I’m travelling.”

David sat up slightly and eyed her cautiously. “Okay.”

She grabbed her toiletry bag and some clothes from her suitcase and gave him a warning look before disappearing into the bathroom. While she left the door open a crack and turned on the water to brush her teeth, she heard the bedspread scratch against his clothes.

Why couldn’t he wait on the couch in the living room like a normal person?

Now the bed would smell a little like him and it irked her that he just made himself comfortable in her space. There was a time when she didn’t mind his scent on her bedding, her clothes and her skin.

Gillian looked through the crack in the door and watched as he shed his jacket to roll across her bed and take a second pillow. A patch of his tanned skin peeked from between his shirt and jeans and she shut the door firmly.

“ _Cool it_ ,” she whispered to herself.

She shed her clothes and turned the water on in the shower to quickly freshen up. It took a short shower, scrubbing her face and changing her panties before pulling her jeans back up to revive her. She put on a fresh cotton T-shirt and a thin black cardigan over her shoulders. As she rubbed moisturizer into her cheeks, she reapplied mascara and ran her fingers through her hair. Maybe she needed a hat.

When she exited the bathroom, David was checking his phone. Probably checking in at home, she told herself. She didn’t want to think of the other alternative.

She took her phone, her purse and a jacket from the closet and glanced towards the living room. She looked at the couch with slight longing because they both knew he could have easily taken over the public living room instead of her private bed if he just had a little bit of decency. She stood at the door of the bedroom with her room key in hand.

“Oh, all set?” he noted.

Gillian nodded slightly. “Yup.”

David climbed off of the messed bed and adjusted the pillows slightly but her pristine room had been tainted. “Great.”

As they walked down the long hallway to the elevator, David’s hand brushed hers and she quickly moved both hands into her jacket pocket. If he noticed the retreat on her part, he didn’t mention it.

As they reached the elevator car, Gillian pressed the down button to head to the lobby. David smirked at her and pressed ‘up.’

“Where are we going?” she asked as she looked up to him.

He was standing with his hands in his pockets and his feet spread more than shoulder width apart. It put some distance between their bodies but lowered him down closer to her eye level. She found it juvenile and annoying.

“You’ll see,” he replied vaguely.

That really annoyed her too and she could feel the crease between her brows as she frowned at him.

“ _Relax_ ,” he coaxed her as he stood up straighter and put his hands on her shoulders to massage them. His fingers pressed into the muscles at the base of her neck and he pushed his thumbs to move in a circular pattern. “God, you’re tight up here too.”

Gillian stepped away from him and crossed her arms under her breasts as she looked at him with shock and disgust. “What?”

He laughed. “I meant your muscles on your _back_ -”

“Compared to where when you said up here too?” she asked as she gestured to the place he had just been touching.

“Oh my god. _No_!” he protested as his eyes grew wide and he shook his head. “That’s not what I meant!”

Gillian shook her head at him and she frowned. “I hope not.”

David shrugged his eyebrows at her with a grin he was obviously fighting. “ _Well_ …”

She clucked her tongue and shook her head. “You’re being gross.”

David scoffed as the door opened to an empty car. “I don’t know what changed but you used to love that side of my _winning_ personality.”

She wasn’t sure why but that made her laugh. It caught her off guard and she wasn’t expecting to feel herself relax so quickly. She wasn’t even sure why she agreed to come for dinner. She promised her kids she would look at the hotel for vacation purposes as a family without the presence of other divorced men in her life.

“I was hoping something self-deprecating would get you to relax,” he noted as they stepped into the elevator car. He scanned his room key, pressed 17 and the doors shut quietly to take them upward. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“I am, a little,” she admitted before her stomach growled a little to echo her sentiments. They shared a paused look and she tilted her head to the side. “More than a little.”

David wrapped his thumb and forefinger around her upper arm and squeezed. “How are you?”

She knew what he was doing and her ease at their situation suddenly dissipated as she furrowed her brow again.

“I’m fine,” she replied automatically and he gave her a look. “I mean, I’m as fine as I can be.”

He released her arm and shoved his hands back in the pockets of his tight jeans. She hated those too.

“I’m sure you understand,” she continued and he shook his head. “You don’t?”

“I don’t really know…” he said as he trailed off in thought. He shifted his lips to the right and then looked at her plainly. “I mean… I feel like I’ve been down this road before but I can’t-”

“ _This_ road?” she questioned.

Certainly, he had been down other rocky paths of bad choices. She had too. They had their troubles and individually taken steps to work on their personal and public personas.

“This setting feels familiar,” he noted. “Fan convention, an elevator except you’re not wearing a little skirt this time.”

There was a heavy pause and she looked up at him with unsure eyes.

“I didn’t agree to dinner with you so that we could-”

“Of _course_ not,” he cut her off and waved one hand. “Why would we?”

She tucked her chin down and studied her shoes. There was a lot there they should have talked about after the wrap of the show but they didn’t. There were times that he called her and they spoke about nothing at all. A few times he called her and they sat in silence while she took a bath and he watched television. They had spent a long time denying what they had for one another and now they were struggling to break it off.

It didn’t help matters that they were both with other people, not that that detail ever stopped them before.

David was like an itch she couldn’t scratch or a craving she couldn’t satiate. There was something about him that made him so delicious on her tongue and giddy inside… She wondered if those feelings would emerge upon arriving in Orlando. Instead, as she saw him right now, she just felt put off and angry.

They were staying in a lovely hotel, the convention relied on them having a good rapport on stage the next day and during the photo ops, so pushing aside her feelings of disgust was imperative. She had to work alongside actors she couldn’t stand in the past - he was one of them a time or two. It only fueled the chemistry between them on screen and they found ways to break [that tension with their bodies sliding against one another in on-set trailers after a food fight.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10734198)

That was a lifetime ago.

She was a different person now. She was less inclined to be his mistress and he had refused to be hers.

Last season of filming proved to be a difficult transition from the people they were to professional costars who kept their clothes on. They couldn’t seem to ignore their desires around one another, even with other people counting on them for loyalty.

“I don’t want to resent you for not choosing me,” he told her. They were laying panting in his trailer on the floor with her long red wig still secured to her head and her costume for Scully scattered about the space. “I mean… I had kept you a secret for years and that wasn’t easy on you.”

“I never resented you,” she insisted as he kissed her shoulder. “Not even now knowing that your… _friend_ is coming into town. I don’t resent our past or what’s going on now.”

“You’re a better person than I am,” he replied. “I’d resent you. I kind of resent you now.”

They were only ever able to meet halfway in the affair but never at the same time. It was a sporadic love that lasted longer than any other relationship she had in her life, personal or professional.

“Thanks for not bringing up her age, by the way,” David commented as he flipped her onto her belly and pressed a firm shaft against her backside. He pulled her hips up so her knees were underneath her and pushed the tip of his member against her folds. “It’s a big gesture.”

He pushed into her with one hard thrust and she called him a string of expletives that would have made Fox Mulder blush. She didn’t like the age of the young woman he was seeing but she couldn’t change that about her anymore than she could change the things about Peter that would grate on her nerves. David and Gillian could banter on screen over abstract details with the kind of chemistry that made other people aroused to watch in such a way that propelled their television show to success. The irony was they couldn’t figure out their own personal lives. Somehow it all felt more tolerable while they had the use of each other’s bodies to numb the problems they tried to ignore. If there was a metaphor for their kind of dysfunction, she couldn’t think of it while he was fucking her.

The elevator car stalled and the door opened to the seventeenth floor. Gillian was shaken from the memory of one of the last intimate conversations they had.

“I hope you brought your appetite for meat,” he noted as they stepped out.

That was almost the same thing he said to her when she met him for dinner in San Diego the night before the comic con. His words were laden with double meaning then too.

“I did,” she replied but this time she wasn’t agreeing beforehand to lose her [panties in a hotel elevator](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3987148/chapters/8951035).

David looked down at her and smirked. He must have caught the stony expression on her face because his smile fell and he nodded once. “You mean dinner.”

“I hope it’s reasonably noisy inside,” she replied icily. “I don’t feel like waking up tomorrow and reading about all your comments that get misconstrued by outside ears.”

David put a hand on her lower back as they walked up to the hostess desk. “Nothing I’m saying is with some kind of underlying tone of discontent like you.”

“A tone of mis-”

“Hi there, welcome to Capa,” the young woman greeted her with a patent Disney smile. “Do you have a reservation?”

David nodded to the young woman. “Two for Ted Fullilove.”

Gillian’s brain put up a red flag regarding the name from his second book. There were a lot of similarities between David and Ted and the character of Ted’s father. It made her uncomfortable to think about the bits in the book she thought were about her and the ones she knew that were and he vowed that weren’t.

“Right this way,” the hostess invited them and they walked through the large dining room towards the edge of the restaurant.

At the beginning of filming the X-Files, David told Gillian to always pick a table in the middle of the restaurant where you were bound to be seen. It was good to be photographed eating at nice restaurants, waiting for valet and walking along sidewalks. For all the good advice he gave her on the set of the show, he also tried to guide her into being better at the celebrity game.

Gillian was naive enough at the time to believe that she could live her sequestered life in Vancouver with her husband, her child and her dog and go to all the awards things like they weren’t a big deal. This was prior to life with a publicist when she believed wearing the same outfit from a music video to an awards show wasn’t a bad idea.

The worst part about being famous was that people expected you never to repeat a dress or an outfit because you should be wasting clothing frivolously instead of growing attached to items as she did. There was a fondness she had for certain flip-flops, flowy tops and puffy coats. It pained her to empty her closet of them but only at the insistence of her much wiser daughter, who ensured her that these pieces were out of style.

The hostess showed David and Gillian a spot that faced the balcony with their backs to the rest of the restaurant. She set their menus on the table and smiled brightly at them as Gillian slid on one seat of the bench and David maneuvered around to sit next to her on an angle.

It might be easier for the waiter when he came by but at the moment, it felt entirely too intimate while his long legs brushed against hers.

“We are featuring some wonderful tapas tonight and our Mojitos are on special for fourteen dollars,” she informed them. “Jason will be right with you.”

A young man, no older than twenty-five, approached their table with a water pitcher at the ready. “Good evening folks. I’m Jason and I’ll be your server this evening. Can I interest you in a Mojito Moderno from the bar?”

Gillian cleared her throat. “I’d love a chamomile tea with honey please.”

David paused and she gave him a look. “A Mojito sounds good.”

“You should get one then,” she encouraged him.

He pulled his lips tight and sighed. “Sure. I’ll have one.”

It used to take less coaxing for him to forego a drink when she was around but it didn’t bother her if he did. She knew that he was drinking more these days than he used to. She chose to ignore that observation because it bothered her too much when she realized why he might be numbing his pain.

The waiter took away their wine glasses and left their table to fetch their drinks.

Gillian studied the menu as she tried to ignore the distinct smell of liquor lingering in the air. Using a liquid substance to numb her personal pain never worked well for her. Maybe she was doing the same but she chose more herbal methods that were soon becoming legal in most states.

She looked down at the red candle holder in the middle of the table and her nerves twitched as she thought about running her fingertips across the flame. Her hands played with the long stem of the wine glass in front of her filled with cold water. She took a long sip as she glanced down at the menu in front of her. They were the annoying kind that didn’t quite fit on the table but held everything on one page. As she studied the menu, nothing on it looked appealing to her at the moment and she frowned.

“We should both get Anderson Ranches, just for the sake of the novelty of eating something you share a name with,” he declared.

“Let’s get one and share something else,” she bartered. Two lamb racks were one too many. “What about the chicken?”

“The what?” he teased.

“ _Pollo_ ,” she sighed.

He grinned at her. “I like your Spanish.”

“It’s rusty,” she commented and took another sip of her water. “My French is better.”

“I thought your Italian was pretty good,” he commented and took a drink of his water.

She turned in the booth to look at his profile and fought the urge to throw her glass at his face. He had seen the pictures of her and Peter together and chose not to comment on them outright. There was a line between a joke and the barbed wire he was hurling around masked as a playful jab. He was flirting with it.

Jason returned with their beverages, placing her tea in front of her before placing David’s drink on the table for him.

“Would you folks like to start off with one of our tapas or something from the Raw Bar?” Jason asked with a smile.

“We’ll take the Higado and Cocas,” David said assuredly. “We want to share the Anderson Ranches and pollo for dinner.”

Jason nodded his head with a smile and took the menus from them to put in their order.

David placed his arm on the back of the booth and turned to her with a grin. “What was I saying?”

“You were playing a dangerous game of embarrassing moments,” she muttered as she turned her mug over and wrapped her fingers around the warmed porcelain. She poured half a cup of tea and emptied a pack of honey into the mug. As she stirred her spoon in the drink, she glanced up to David to see him eyeing her cautiously. “What?”

“You felt embarrassed by that?” he asked. “Surely you can laugh about that now. You went naked for PETA. What’s the difference?”

“I was on a trip with a man I spent half the time fighting with and he shouldn’t have done that where someone could see,” she replied calmly.

“You’ve been far more brazen around my pool in the past,” he nudged her.

She looked up at him and wondered if he could sense the regret she felt about that. “Those pictures of us never made it to the internet.”

David shrugged off their tryst as they swam in his Malibu pool, spending some heavy money preventing to see the front page of a tabloid. At the time, it would have hurt too many people on his end. On her end, it would have opened a can of worms she wasn’t prepared to deal with. It took her four years to stop wondering if it would have been easier for all of them if they had just admitted to an affair.

That was a stark contrast to the situation she faced after a week in Italy. Peter ignored the call from his agent and tossed his phone into his gym bag before muttering something about his ‘ex-wife’ deserving a wake up. The man didn’t seem to have a care if she had an opinion on the matter let alone how things on her end would be perceived.

“Well, it certainly confirmed you as his girlfriend,” he noted and she shrugged as she looked out to the view in front of her. “Didn’t it?”

“I don’t want to talk about Italy,” she sighed.

She could feel him thinking next to her but she didn’t want to look into his eyes. He liked to flirt with danger and play with fire. The man never played it safe, even when he had everything to lose.

Why was he acting like he had nothing to lose these days? The man couldn’t be behaving more recklessly. She recognized the actions and behaviours from a twelve-step program she found useful in the past. He behaved like a man with impulse control issues while suffering from self-obsession and often shifted any blame in their scenario onto her. The man David used to be… the man she felt a love for used to own his own pile of the mess instead of blaming her busy schedule on what fell apart between them.

Gillian sighed again and looked up as he was watching her face intently. “Do you want to talk about it?”

He narrowed his eyes at her and shook his head. He took a long sip from his drink and set it down slowly on the table. “I might but I know that only opens up my side of things and you’re probably going to say a lot more about my situation than I care to listen to.”

David’s pocket vibrated and he pulled the device out to look at the screen. He pressed the sleep button on the side and put it in his jacket pocket.

“Are you needed?” she asked quietly.

David shook his head. “Just Mitch wondering what I was up to.”

“Are you going to call him back?” she asked and he shrugged. “Why not?”

“Gill-”

She didn't like that he sounded so exasperated with her when she was just asking questions.

“If this is just a friendly dinner-”

“It is,” he insisted with a grumble in his voice. 

She was about to apologize for pushing it until she looked down at her shoulder where his thumb was tracing circles lightly on her sweater and back up to him. “What are you _doing_?”

She tried to shrug off his touch but his palm closed over her shoulder and gave her a squeeze. He grinned at her brazenly and pulled her closer towards him on the booth. Her breath caught in her throat and she felt her cheeks flush.

“ _Seriously_?” she asked incredulously as she put her hands between them and pushed on his strong chest. “What are you doing?”

David loosened his grip and slumped against the back of the booth. She tried not to comment on his hand not moving and she could see his eyes catching her expression.

“ _Jesus_ , Gill,” he scoffed. “Could you be slightly less uptight? I’m not going to attack you.”

They took a beat to breathe and the air was tense and uncomfortable between them. She knew that complicated, messy, difficult and uncomfortable was the last thing he liked to be around. Suddenly, she needed to flee but she couldn't go back to her room and leave him there. She was in a pickle.  

She sighed and tried to force herself to relax. “I need to use the ladies room.”

David released her shoulder and she pushed her hands into the bench to move off the seat. She felt him watching her as she walked away. She tried to calm her nerves and ignore the rush of excitement that surged from a brief moment of close proximity. She needed to get her hormones under control. Every time she let go of them, she found herself naked and sweaty with part of him inside of her.

That couldn’t happen again.


	2. Chapter 2

He could feel the disappointment in him vibrating off her intensely as she sat down across the table. He looked at the space next to him where she had previously occupied and frowned. The look on her face was steeled and her posture was stiff. She looked skittish and angry at him. It was a mixed bag of emotions she was carrying with her and he wasn’t enjoying it.

His life these days was all about enjoyment. He didn’t ask his friend for dinner to feel judged or whatever else she was doing. He could do the same to her life.

This was supposed to be something to relax them before the weekend but instead he was facing an adversary. He missed the woman he used to meet with on casual weekends who laughed at his jokes and could relax around him. This woman was carrying the baggage of heartbreak he caused her and it wasn’t something he liked being reminded of. In all honesty, he wanted to spend time with the woman he saw on set during work hours and in private, not the woman she portrayed in the media wanting little to do with him. If he was being honest, she went back and forth from how she was to him on social media to her quotes about him but it was confusing, nevertheless.

“Feeling better?” he asked as she moved her water glass in front of her. “Where are you going?”

Gillian shivered, even though she was wearing three layers under her jacket, but he resisted the urge to give her his coat. It wasn’t that air conditioned in the restaurant. “I think we need space.”

“ _Why_?” he asked as he picked up his drink and finished it off. He set the glass down on the table top gently and pushed the tumbler to the edge.

“You said you’d do this sober,” she countered without answering his question.

It annoyed him that he couldn’t get an answer out of her without being asked something in return. He wanted her to freely admit things without it feeling like he was pulling teeth. He needed her to open up and ask him more than just surface area questions. It occurred to him that it was possible she didn’t want to probe too far because she didn’t want the whole truth about his life. This wasn’t the first time she avoided wanting to know about him and what was going on with his life. The last time it was to protect her from feeling bad about an ongoing affair and he didn’t blame her then. He didn’t ask too many uncomfortable questions about her life either.

Jason, their waiter, came by and moved the glass towards him. “Would you like another?”

David waved his hand in what he hoped was a polite refusal. “One’s enough.”

“Your appetizers should be out in a moment,” Jason informed them and topped up Gillian’s water with a jug.

He left with the empty Mojito glass but the look on Gillian’s face prompted David to contemplate ordering another.

“So,” he started and she raised her eyebrows in question as she leaned her elbows on the table. “You abandoned me over here.”

Gillian furrowed her brow and shook her head. “I didn’t _abandon_ you.”

David was sure he said something with the same tone to her during the show but he couldn’t remember right then. Maybe he shouldn’t have had those shots in his room before picking her up.

“You abandoned me in Montreal,” he commented with a grin.

“You seemed to fair _well_ without me,” she sighed and he scoffed. “I meant during the panel.”

He just wanted to have a nice night together. He was hoping she would come to dinner, laugh at his jokes and be the one to suggest they have a nightcap in her room. He wanted her to be pliable and sweet to him the way she had been while he was going through his divorce.

A thought occurred to him that maybe she was only as nice as she was because he was going through such a hard time. Another one popped in that she was also losing her significant other and possibly her sweetness was the cause of being so unhappy with someone else at home. The frigid posture across from him was a guard she had up to prevent herself from messing up her relationship with her British boyfriend.

That made him feel even worse. He didn’t have any complaints about his current situation. It was light, breezy and fun. That’s all he wanted right now. He liked feeling adored and listened to. He enjoyed the fact that he spent time with someone who was so simple and uncomplicated that his mere presence was appreciated.

Gillian seemed annoyed by the fact that he was even breathing. The stark contrast from who he spent his time with now was almost painful. He liked feeling adored and wanted. He needed that after feeling so wrecked for the last few years….

“ _Years_?” she repeated.

David’s heart stopped a beat. “What?”

“You just said you felt _wrecked_ the last few years,” she informed him as she shivered slightly in her chair.

What the hell was she was so cold for? It wasn’t that cool in there. He felt fine.

“I didn’t,” he denied. “Why do you keep shivering?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “I’m cold.”

He looked around. “It’s not cold in here.”

Without knowing why, he reached across the table and took her wrist with one hand and pushed her sleeves up her forearm. He wrapped his fingers completely around her arm and he felt her skin warm to his touch. In another lifetime he would have wrapped his arms around her so he could help her body temperature regulate with his but they were living drastically different lives now. 

He watched her eyes focus on his hand and he noted the pink in her cheeks. He liked that her body responded to his, even if she wasn’t looking at him with a smile that told him the ways in which her mouth could wreck and ruin him.

He missed that smile.

“You said you were sad the last few years,” she reminded him.

David shook his head with a denying frown. “No.”

“I heard you say, and I quote, I need it _after a few years of being sad_ and I want to know why you would say that,” she inquired with a steady tone. She sounded like a character he used to peel the layers off to fuck the woman underneath. “You were sad for a few years?”

He paused and let out a long sigh. “I don’t really want to-”

“Why not?” she jumped in with more interest than he had seen in a while. Maybe it was because it had to do with something about her. “Why weren’t you happy?”

David held his tongue. That was a heavy question he didn’t really want to answer. He had tried his best to hide his misery while she continued to pull further and further away from him. He tried to allow her the space to figure out what she wanted while he watched her slowly realize that it wasn’t him.

He wanted to feel happy and adored but she wanted someone who would work for her. He doubted either of them were getting what they wanted these days.

Gillian gave him an expecting look and he realized she was still waiting on his answer. She was asking about the past and he didn’t know if he had the heart to break it to her.

“Right, why wasn’t I happy?” he repeated. “That was the question?”

She nodded slowly with her lips pursed. They were wet and he wondered when he missed her doing that. He used to revel in those small moments when the attention she drew to her mouth made him a little hard.

“Well,” he started with a grin. “I can admit I’m selfish and need a lot of accolades.”

“ _Really_ ,” she commented.

“Could you admit the same about yourself?” he challenged and her eyes looked at him sharply. “The accolades part. No one would ever call _you_ selfish.”

Gillian’s mouth crooked up in a smirk. “I can admit I’m _demanding_.”

David’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Really?”

“I’m not totally unaware,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “That doesn’t change how I feel about _certain_ things.”

“January?” he asked in regards to his decision to skip her Walk of Fame ceremony at the last minute. She nodded her head slightly. “In my defence, I don’t want to hang out with the guy. I think I’m entitled to that.”

She sighed. “That’s fine.”

In all truth, spending an entire day with the guy she had been spending the last two years with shouldn’t be something he should be expected to do. He never expected her to choose to spend time with him and Tea during his marriage, not that it stopped her from coming to his play premiere, house parties or whatever.

“Obviously not,” he muttered and their eyes met again for a beat.

“Here’s the appetizers!” Jason announced as he placed the plates between them. “Oh, you’re over here now.”

Jason was commenting on Gillian’s change in geography at their table.

“I’m trying the view from over here,” Gillian commented in an offhand way that reminded him of his glibness towards uncomfortable situations in the past.

Jason set the food between them and she sighed at the smell wafting up to her. “The Higado here is a favourite. This flatbread has an amazing smoked cheese that you’ll die for.”

Gillian made eye contact with David truly for the first time since he had her pinned under him at the booth. He wanted to kiss her. She looked like someone who needed him to take her away and help her escape what she was going through.

He was smug and egotistical enough to know that he liked the idea of saving her from her life in England. He had hoped prior to meeting that he could be a saviour of hers of some kind and try to encourage her to be a happier person in her life. He was certain he couldn’t get her to move to New York with her boys, that was a lost cause. Two years ago, he had looked into the possibilities of that life together and the legal hoops they were expected to jump through to get the boys to live in the United States were too much of a headache before her ex-partner pulled the plug on the idea entirely.

“This bread smells delicious,” David noted.

Jason held out his hands in question. “Do we need anything else?”

“We’re good,” David assured him.

As their young waiter walked away, he looked back to see Gillian inhaling the smell of the flatbread in front of her. It was shocking to see her collarbones so pronounced and her cheekbones so sharp in contrast from the hungry, young woman he met almost three decades ago.

“Does that smell good?” he asked with a hint of innuendo as he picked up his napkin to lay it across his nap. Gillian nodded emphatically. “Let’s get something in you.”

“God, _please_ ,” she sighed. Gillian gave him a sharp look and held up her finger at him in warning. “Don’t say anything.”

David felt a stirring in his jeans and he let it ride. As young as he felt sometimes, the random occurrences of a spontaneous erection were no longer an embarrassment as they were in his youth but now a delight at the thought his virility was still in working order.

He watched as she carefully moved a slice of the flatbread with a fork and knife to a small plate. She then slid the plate in front of her to begin making small bite-sized pieces of the food. She then slid half the portion to one side and put the knife along the divide in the plate. Immediately, a red flag went up in his brain. He knew this pattern of hers.

“Portion control?” he commented.

She looked up from the plate as she stabbed the food with her fork and they held eye contact as he watched her decide how to answer. “ _No_.”

He knew her well enough to know the difference between her acting and her lying. That was a bold-faced lie. Unfortunately, calling her on that might prevent some horizontal activities he wanted to partake in later. Or vertical. He wasn’t picky and neither was she when it came to pleasures of the flesh.

He hoped that their unspoken agreement still held up despite her very public relationship and his not so secret companion.

He pulled a slice of the flatbread onto the small plate and stifled a belch. After taking a long drink of water, he eyed her cautiously. “I like it when you have some curves.”

Gillian looked down at her lap and then up to him. He was prepared for her to tear into him about commenting on her body, talking about things he had no business in and other such defensive techniques.

She made a face at him. “I have tits. I have a waist. I just have less of an ass.”

David decided to go for it. “It was a good ass though.”

She paused as the fork was an inch away from her mouth and smirked. “I’m surprised you’d remember.”

Oh, he remembered. He remembered _big_ time.

It wasn’t that long ago he saw her in all her naked glory but in the last year, she had lost some of the softness to her curves. It wasn’t that he could complain either way. He was still getting a taste of her when she belonged to someone else.

“ _What_?” she asked and he tilted his chin at her. “You looked sad for a second.”

David sighed as he cut into a slice of the flatbread. “I don’t want to bum you out.”

She held a piece of the bread close to her lips and sighed. “I’m already kind of bummed out.”

David watched as the food slipped past her lips and she chewed slowly. He ate a slice of the bread and set his fork down as he pushed his tongue along his upper teeth.

“I suppose I’m still kind of getting over what happened,” he admitted. “Between us. The show… your decision to end it all. How we finished _things_ …”

“I told him I wouldn’t come back to another trope of a character when she didn’t deserve that,” she reminded him again about her conversation with Chris and he nodded in agreement. “If I’m going to be tied to Scully for the rest of my life, I shouldn’t have to play that crap. She deserves better than all that.”

He didn’t like the end of the series either. A late-in-life pregnancy, the dialogue and lack of closure for the characters that would try to force them to come back to close out a poorly written revival… He understood it. At the time, he encouraged her to read a script for the twelfth season before making any final choices but her mind was made up.

He knew you couldn’t convince someone to want to do something after their heart left it. He wasn’t able to stay on when Chris and the network wouldn’t move the show to a movie series. It killed the desire he had to continue to portray a character that in any other universe would have lost his job and possibly been heavily medicated in a facility.

“I agree,” he nodded. “I mean, you were Blanche Dubois for Christ’s sake and I guess after doing that twice, you don’t really want to do anything less than Tennessee Williams.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “I can’t believe you’re paying me a compliment so I have to assume you’re making fun of me.”

“You’d be wrong,” he said with a grin and she gave him an expression that he couldn’t quite read. “What’s going on with you? Things were fine when we finished filming and by January, you were mad at me.”

Gillian sighed and looked conflicted as she ate another piece of the bread. “Well…”

“Really?” he questioned and she looked at him in confusion. “I didn’t think you’d have a laundry list.”

“David,” she sighed.

They stared at one another across the table and he shook his head. “Fine, don’t tell me.”

“You know it’s not going to help us get through this weekend,” she pointed out to him as she leaned back from the table and crossed her arms under her breasts. She shivered again and he rolled his eyes. “Why are you acting like a spoiled teenager?”

“Spend a lot of time around young people and you start picking up their habits,” he muttered.

“Maybe you should find some _age-appropriate_ friends,” she snapped back.

“I knew it,” he said as he pointed his fork at her and she rolled her eyes. “And you’re rolling your eyes too! What’s the difference?”

Gillian sat up a little and pursed her lips. “You’re acting more like a half-man, half-boy than when I met you. It’s not charming or funny or cute.”

“I didn’t realize it was my job to endear you to me,” he replied as he set his cutlery down heavily on his plate. The clang of the metal against the porcelain was sharp and she winced. “I thought twenty-five years of friendship might have done that.”

He really didn’t understand what her problem was. She was supposed to be living her best life with her feminist manifesto published, her high brow British boyfriend and more theatre work that would garner attention from the right people. He was the one doing the Comic Con circuits like she had years ago when her career was stagnant and the only people who cared about the X-Files were fans from the original run of the show. He had to push his music, his books and his persona as Mulder from X-Files instead of looking to new acting or directing projects while Miss Subways stalled to become a movie.

This would never have happened if they just turned the X-Files television show into a movie series like he suggested but with scripts and dialogue that didn’t make him groan audibly as he read them. Arguably, if he was going to resent one thing from his career, it was that Fox executives and Chris ignored his suggestions.

Gillian took a long drink of water and shifted in her chair uncomfortably. He could tell there was more than just his lack of presence at the Walk of Fame ceremony that was bothering her.

“What happened?” he pushed her.

“You could have toughed it out for one afternoon in the rain to be there,” she said. “After all the other shit you didn’t do-”

“Gillian,” he cut her off. “You _can’t_ … you can’t still be mad about that fight-”

“I’m not mad,” she interrupted sharply. “I’m now just _disappointed_. It just adds to the list of things-”

“And I don’t have a _list_ of things?” he countered and her lips parted just slightly as she let out a small squeak of protest. “I’m sorry that I didn’t stand up for you with Nancy. I’m _sorry_ I didn’t want to move to New York City full time for a part-time relationship with you. I’m sorry that I wasn’t more aggressive with Chris about his scripts. I respect his vision-”

“Ugh!” she exclaimed. “I can’t listen to this!”

“Gill-”

Jason approached the table with a water pitcher and David waved his hand at the young man. He gave David a panicked look and walked away quickly.

“ _No_ ,” she replied emphatically. “He wrecked it. He wrecked what we built. He made Scully a trope and another victim again and he ruined the other characters along with it. Don’t act like you’re not mad at me for not coming back but I would rather do bit parts on different BBC miniseries than spend another five months of my life watching him ruin what used to be a feminist icon.”

David leaned back against the bench and let out a breath. “I thought… you were angry at me-”

“Don’t be so fucking _selfish_ ,” Gillian snapped. “This isn’t just about _you_. As great as it was that they gave the kids a shot to do what they could, I can’t work on something out of loyalty anymore. Chris _never_ told me it would be a three season revival. He kept that detail hidden from me like the last script. He told me we would come back for one and when he ended it the way he did, I felt forced to come back for the eleventh season-”

“Forced?” he repeated with a raised eyebrow.

“Compelled,” she suggested.

“You got _paid_ ,” he reminded her. “You didn’t volunteer those hours.”

“You want to talk money with me?” she challenged him. “Before you tell me I’m being emotional, just remember I have just _as many_ people needing me to support them as you do.”

She had a point and he really should know better by now than to tell Gillian to get the right representation. She knew now to wait for what David was offered and tell the powers that be that she would take no less than the same.

David looked at the other tables around them and noticed the sideways glances. They didn’t look like Mulder and Scully getting a bite to eat, especially with her almost white hair with the harsh cut and his five-day scruff. They were still who they were and it was only a matter of time before this conversation ended up in a rag magazine.

“I don’t want to talk money,” he commented quietly as he rubbed a hand across his face. “I just wanted us to have a nice night. I was hoping for something more pleasant than the last time we saw each other.”

“What was wrong with the last time we spoke to each other?” she asked and took another sip of water.

“That’s what I mean,” he clarified. “That was _fine_.”

If he was recalling correctly, it was slightly better than fine but they were herded through a cattle call of different press interviews. Her sharp look with her new white-blonde hair and fashion-forward, black jumpsuit was supposed to be more business than sexual. That harsh appearance didn’t stop him from slowly unzipping the back in her private dressing room and palming her bare breast before he pushed into her.

“Fine?” she repeated and he watched her cheeks pink.

“Well, I know I had a _great_ time,” he commented glibly. “I think you had _twice_ the amount of good times as I did.”

Gillian gave him a shocked expression and looked down at her food. When she met his eyes again, her tone was serious. “Get all this out of your system now. You can’t do that during the panel tomorrow.”

People half expected them to have a flirtatious innuendo during any interaction and she should know by now that it wasn’t something he was able to resist. She couldn’t really withhold that side of her personality either. Even during their darkest times on set when they weren’t speaking, the chemistry worked. It was both a blessing and a curse to have that kind of charisma and magnetism with another actress that annoyed and excited you at the same time.

David picked up a piece of the toast with the foie gras and syrup on it. He moved it from side to side in front of his mouth as he studied how to best bite into it. Gillian moved a piece at the same time onto the small plate in front of her and used her fork and knife to cut into the item.

She took his fork and speared it into her food then held it out over the table to him. He held on to her wrist as he guided the fork past his lips and then slid his fingers gingerly to her hand to take the utensil from her.

She looked away quickly and cut into the appetizer to give herself a similar bite. The huckleberry and pine syrup was delicious but foie gras had never been his favourite. As they chewed in slow unison, he reminded himself he knew what tastes were on her tongue. He didn’t need to find out later when she let her guard down and he finally got to act on his desire to have her again.

Against their better judgement, David assumed the sexual side of their relationship would continue. As often as she declared it wouldn’t or couldn’t, as many times as she insisted it was wrong to continue whatever they were doing, they fell into bed, against a wall, on a couch or in a car. There was something basic, hormonal and urgent about the demanding desires they had for one another. As much as he could predict tonight that she would declare she was going to her room alone, he knew how much she still wanted him. He was just more upfront about what he wanted.

At first, he declined to be the side piece in her very public relationship. That declaration lasted a week into working together in Vancouver. They had been filming a long hospital scene where Mulder slit a man’s throat and they had a long, poorly written conversation. They held hands, her face was covered in false blood and bruising while she wore a paper thin gown and waffled cotton housecoat. She was trembling as they called cut and he pulled her aside to speak with her privately. It was lucky that the crew this time around knew to allow them some space when they gave a pointed look.

The aftertaste of the foie gras disagreed with his palate and he shook his head at the appetizer.

“I think I would have preferred the oysters to this,” he commented.

Gillian arched an eyebrow. “For fifty-two dollars, I would hope it would taste better than this.”

David ran his tongue along his cheek and waved to Jason as he stood by with the water pitcher. Jason approached with raised eyebrows and a worried look.

“Everything okay, folks?” Jason asked.

“This isn’t really our thing,” David said gesturing to the foie gras. “Can we order the oysters instead?”

“Just the dozen,” Gillian clarified. “Not the… crab and shrimp and all that.”

Jason nodded and took away the foie gras from their table. “Not a problem.”

When Jason left their table, David and Gillian looked at one another for a beat.

“You know, I never do that,” he admitted. “I feel _bad_ now.”

Gillian took a long sip of her water. “I’d rather you say you didn’t like something while you were eating it until the end.”

David grinned at her. “I forget you used to be a waitress.”

“Nobody wanted me in their bag of chips commercials,” she replied.

“Didn’t you do a commercial for Hardees?” he laughed.

Gillian cackled, throwing her head back and putting her hands lightly on her chest. It was the kind of laugh he longed to hear in bed but that kind of giddy happiness women experience with him was fleeting. It was a sign she was more pliable to his charms than she let on earlier.

“I did! The guy… I think he showed up and was slimy so I didn’t end up hooking up with him or whatever our plan was.”

“What was the premise of the commercial?” he asked her and expecting her to deny knowing anything.

“This was during the time when personal ads were how people met,” Gillian reminded him and he nodded along. “Tinder without pictures.”

“Which is why you turned the guy away?” he guessed and she shrugged. “You were expecting a young hotshot but you got a balding, middle-aged guy in a convertible who was too slick?”

“That commercial paid my rent for six months,” she pointed out. “Roy Rogers rebranding with dating profiles in the newspaper was smart and topical. The residuals weren’t bad.”

David finished off his water. “You were probably living in a shoebox apartment with low overhead so you really can’t compare that to what you’d need now.”

She nodded. “I was living with a wannabe artist who could tell the difference between red ochre and sienna but had no idea how to write a cheque or the importance of monogamy.”

He wanted to ask if every past relationship had been a disappointment but he didn’t want the answer to that. He knew he let her down and he felt admittedly sad when things didn’t come together for them.

Truth be told, the longest time they had spent together as a couple was the filming of the first revival season, but it was all so secretive, he couldn’t pinpoint if the realness of their enjoyment for each other was authentic.

They had tried a hundred times for their chance and nothing ever worked out. Eventually, she got tired of losing the same argument and he wasn’t able to see that look of disappointment in her eyes.

If he was a romantic, he might compare it to the relationship of their onscreen counterparts but he had grown to despise that affair as much as he disliked anyone bringing up her name during an interview that was supposed to be about his work. Gillian had likened their pairing on the X-Files to an arranged marriage, but he didn’t feel it was as terrible as she made it sound until her star shone brighter than his - not that he would ever admit that to her. There was a time when he might have been able to handle that kind of vulnerability with her but now he felt more wary of opening up to her.

“How did you enjoy London?” she asked after they had sat in silence for a beat.

David shrugged. “It wasn’t bad. A lot of great people. London fans were a little more intense than you told me about but very polite so that stiff upper lip the English have wasn’t so bad… Did you guys just discover American spices? The food was different than I remember.”

“I like how you pair me in with the Brits when I can’t even get a part on the show about their monarchy,” she muttered. “Did your…friend enjoy the city? Did you take her sightseeing?”

He smirked at her choice of a label. “I guess. She did what she usually does. Sleep in, go to the gym, eat an expensive lunch.”

Gillian’s mouth crooked up as well and they shared a very brief smile at someone else’s expense. “Sorry about our dinner plans falling through.”

“Hey, a kid gets the flu. You know I’d rather steer one hundred feet from it,” he forgave her. “It was nice of you to warn me.”

“Maybe next time,” she commented but he knew that wasn’t a real offer.

The only reason she agreed to dinner tonight was that he offered to do it solo. Gillian had been doing everything she could to avoid the woman in his private life as much as he had been going out of his way to avoid her boyfriend. Of all the things they owed to one another, he didn’t want that to include being nice to the people they dated after each other.

If he was a grown up, he might be urging her to open up and accept an invitation to dine when it was more than just him and her but he wasn’t concerned if Gillian would like the person he spent his downtime with. As much as he liked to think he wasn’t a complicated person, the relationship with Gillian always made things trickier when he started seeing someone.

He could ignore the complications of the lack of monogamy when it came to Gillian still being someone he slept with from time to time. On either end, he never gave it much thought. Too much contemplation on that forefront just made him slightly depressed. Of all the women he had slept with, and he could admit there had been a fair few, she was the one woman he never tired of. She was the one woman who could excite him with just a touch. She was the one woman who consistently surprised him and he desired just from a gesture or a nod.

Some might call that love and devotion but it wasn’t anything like his marriage so he ignored that completely. Gillian could still drive him crazy with desire while she made him frustrated and annoyed. Occasionally, it was like he was dealing with someone too impossible to argue with and it was easier to let her have her way than to continue to fight about something she would happily go nine rounds over.

Jason arrived with empty hands and a grin. “Your dinner is ready.”

David looked at Gillian and then back to Jason with a patient smile. “Just bring it all at the same time, I guess. We’ll have a smorgasbord. Maybe bring some take-out containers because I know we won’t eat it all.”

Gillian narrowed her eyes at David but smiled tightly up to their waiter. He made a comment she didn’t appreciate and he was about to pay for it.

Once Jason left the table, she leaned onto her elbows and hissed at him, “If you comment on my eating one more time, I’m going to cut off-”

“Hey!” he cut her off holding up his hands defensively. “I just meant it’s a lot of food.”

“You ordered it!” she pointed out angrily.

“Because I like watching you pick and choose from different plates while making little noises!” he explained but her face never altered from the angry look she was giving him. “God, you’re really on edge. What the hell did I do?”

She clenched her jaw and leaned against the chair back with her arms folded. She was practically steaming. Whatever she was angry about couldn’t be the food comment.

“Here we go!” Jason announced as he and two other waiters set down plates around them and two plastic containers with their lids tucked underneath them. “Bon appetit!”

This definitely was way too much food. David looked from the oysters to the chicken and took in a deep breath. It all smelled delicious but it was a lot and the last thing he wanted to do was to eat too much and look bloated through every picture tomorrow.

“You think you’d be able to eat half of this?” he asked her and she shook her head slightly. “Well don’t admit you overreacted or anything.”

It was October and this was the last time they were going to see one another with the excuse of a convention to hide their nightly activities. He didn’t want to think of it as a last dance but maybe in a way, it was.

Gillian narrowed her eyes at him. “It’s easier to feel annoyed and angry with you right now than apathetic so would you _let_ me?”

“Hey, far be it from me to get in the way of you working through some _emotional_ shit,” he commented and she let out a quick breath. “Just relax. I’m not going to bite you. I’m not here to bait you into an argument.”

She shifted in her seat and looked longingly at the food in front of them. “I’m _trying_ to relax.”

David cut off a piece of the chicken and scooped the potatoes, truffles and asparagus onto each of their plates. He looked up at her as he put some of the mushrooms next to it and then did the same for her. “Why can’t you just let your guard down and have a _nice_ time?”

Gillian carefully cut a piece of the mushroom, chicken and potato then speared them carefully onto her fork. She looked up at him with her icy blue eyes. “The last time I let my guard down, I ended up with my pants around my _ankles_ while I was being fucked over a chair.”

David chuckled as he put some of the lamb onto their plates. “You say that like it’s a bad thing!”

“It isn’t great,” she defended. “Not when we both have- uh - other _people_.”

“You didn’t mind the other times you were married,” he replied slyly as he watched the food disappear past her lips and the tines slide slowly out of her mouth. “Maybe you shouldn’t eat like you’re fucking the utensils if you don’t want me to think about fucking _you_.”

Gillian set her cutlery down. “You’re _gross_.”

“ _I’m_ gross?” he repeated and put a bite into his mouth. He chewed quickly as she nodded at him. “That’s rich coming from the woman who used to get wet from those kinds of comments.”

“I’m not that person anymore,” she replied quietly as she pulled the fork towards her lips. “I’ve grown up.”

David swallowed his mouthful and took a sip of his water. “Oh really? At fucking fifty, you’re such a grown up that you don’t swear or enjoy an edible or have fun?”

With a toss of her head back, he could almost picture her warm golden locks falling around her shoulders. The mannerisms were still there as she fidgeted like a woman mourning the ghost of the hair she used to have. Now she was sporting a harsh, almost white blonde bob. It reminded him of when she was in her twenties and trying to prove she was an adult as she competed with women ten to twenty years her senior in the awards categories. This was his least favourite of looks she had. At least before, she was red and the hair on her head looked like fire as it fell around her face when she rode him in the quiet moments between long night shoots in a trailer pelted by a dreary Canadian rainfall and the autumn leaves that were just shades off from her colour.

She might claim not to remember much about Vancouver or what she ate the day before but he hoped to God she never forgot all the times they made each other quake.

Gillian was still steaming in her chair so far away from him, across the table. “You don’t get anywhere in this business, especially among the Brits, if you’re seen as-”

“You’re _American_ ,” he cut her off flatly.

She set down her cutlery again. “You keep saying shit like that and I’m going back to my room.”

“You are!” he retorted with a laugh.

She wiped the edges of her mouth with the white linen napkin and looked around the restaurant. “Good night.”

“You’re _not_ serious,” he scoffed as he called her bluff.

“Like a heart attack,” she muttered as she looked around under the table.

“ _What_ are you doing?” he asked her as he leaned over to look under the table too.

“I can’t find my bag,” she explained as she stood up.

Suddenly, David wasn't concerned about their fight and only focused on the missing item. He glanced around the floor and watched her face fixate into a panic.

“Did you leave it in the bathroom?” he asked her.

Gillian stopped looking for a moment and stood up. “Did I take it with me to the bathroom?”

David rolled his eyes and put his napkin on the table next to his plate. “Jesus woman, if you want to storm out on someone, you should have your shit together before you do it.”

“ _Life lessons with_ Mr. _Duchovny_ ,” she goaded.

“Go look in the bathroom and I’ll look under here,” he offered with a gesture for her to get moving. Her brows were furrowed and her arms were crossed under her breasts but she remained looking as skeptical as Dana Scully in an edgier outfit. “Seriously, go.”

She reached into her back pocket of her jeans and pulled out her room key. “Maybe I left my bag in my room.”

“Well storm out on me and if I find your purse, I’ll have one of the bellhops send it up with some food,” he offered.

It was obvious that his proposal didn’t assuage her fears she’d lost her bag. He was a selfish asshole, admittedly but he wasn’t about to leave her stranded without her ID and money for the weekend. Gillian didn’t seem convinced.

“Fine, I’ll go look in the ladies bathroom and see if your bag is in there. You stay here and feed yourself tiny bites of this food I’ve already paid for,” he snapped.

Jason approached the table apprehensively. “Is everything okay folks?”

“Oh fine, I just need to find my bag,” Gillian informed him with a half-truth.

“Could someone pack all this up for us?” David requested. “It’s amazing but I have to call home and it’s getting late.”

Gillian picked up on his overture and she rolled her eyes with her arms still crossed tightly. She gave Jason an apologetic smile. “Thank you, it _was_ amazing.”

“I can have this sent up to your suite, sir,” Jason offered.

David pulled out two twenties from his jeans pocket and dropped them on the table. “Thanks for the trouble. You can charge the room for the meal.”

When he looked up from Jason’s appreciative face, David noticed Gillian had taken off towards the bathrooms. He shook his head at her behaviour but decided to help her find her purse anyway.

As he leaned down to look under the table, he spotted the black bag with the tassels and studs. It was not the kind of bag he would think a serious English-wannabe actress might choose but Gillian never did what he expected of her, especially when it came to fashion.

He hooked the bag over his shoulder and gave Jason an appreciative pat on his shoulders. “Just… I don’t know, send them to my room I guess. You have my credit card.”

“Sure thing,” Jason replied with a nod.

David crossed the restaurant hopeful that no one had been listening to their conversations. He avoided the gaze of onlookers in the way he had grown accustomed to once he became aware of his own celebrity.

Gillian was leaving the ladies room with a frustrated expression and she turned on her heel towards the elevators as her feet stomped on the tile floor. Apparently, she could block out his gaze the way he ignored those around him. There was a time when she used to be able to sense when he walked into a room. Oh, how times had changed.

The doors on the elevator began to close and David put his hand up to stop the sliding mechanism. The car shifted and beeped once at them but the doors remained open.

“Can you just let me leave?” she snapped.

David held up her bag and Gillian took a step towards him with her hand out. He cocked his head and gave her a warning look as he held the bag up higher and further away from her.

“Are you going to let me in?” he asked.

Gillian stepped back from the door and he walked into the elevator car. She held her hand out to him for the bag but he kept his arm at his side with his grip firmly around the leather straps. It wasn’t light and he assumed she had the usual items in her bag, even though she was travelling.

“ _Thank_ you,” he replied with sarcasm and he hit the button for his floor.

Gillian snapped her gaze to his face and turned towards him to stare him down. “I don’t appreciate your irreverence towards our situation.”

“Good word,” he commented flippantly.

“There,” she pointed at him. “Just all of that. Stop it. Don’t try to be _cute_ or funny or charming.”

“I’m not _trying_ to do anything,” he defended. “Now if you think anything I’m saying is that-”

“Ugh! Just stop it!” she cut him off as she pushed on his chest slightly.

“What do you think is going to happen, Gill?” he asked her as he took another step towards her and she took one back to maintain the distance. “Seriously? You can’t be within five feet of me? Do I _disgust_ you that much or you don’t trust yourself?”

She held her hands up. “David…”

He smirked and set her bag down as he took another step towards her. “I’m not going to do anything to you.”

Gillian’s back hit the elevator wall and her breath caught in her throat. She looked at him with flushed cheeks and he watched her pupils dilate. “This is a bad idea-”

David leaned closer to her with his hands on either side of her on the railing that bordered the elevator car. “I won’t kiss you.”

“Good,” she whispered as her eyes glanced down to his mouth. She moistened her lips with her pink tongue anyway and shifted her feet. She was breathing deeper and he glanced down her chest to see her nipples perked under her sweater. “This is _wrong_. We’re both with other people.”

“I agree,” he lied with a nod and widened his stance so they were more at eye level. “I’m not going to kiss you unless you ask me to.”

A tremor took over her body and he saw the desire for him in her eyes. The air between them was electric and he could feel himself getting hard as their clothing brushed against each other.

“I can’t….” her voice drifted off as her mouth moved closer to his.

It was as though she wanted him to cross the line first but in this situation, she had to be the one to choose him. She had to make the move first so that he wasn’t someone who could be blamed for what was to transpire next. If they were going to do this, he couldn’t coerce her or convince her. It had to be her idea.

He could feel the warmth of her mouth on the skin of his face and her breathing had altered to a mild pant. He could see the look of wanton in her eyes and her body moved against the wall of the elevator to brush her torso against his. She was trying to coerce him into making the first move so that she had an easy out with her guilt about it later. He wasn’t going to let her off the hook that easy.

“David,” she whispered as she closed her eyes and brushed her lips against his.

She was soft and wet already. She pushed her hips against his and he groaned at the pressure on his cock. The wetness of her mouth made him think of other places of her body that he wanted to touch, taste and feel with everything he had.

“Don’t do that unless you want me too,” he warned her.

She held his gaze for a long beat and her hands threaded into his hair with familiarity and confidence. “I do.”

She pulled his mouth to hers and her tongue pushed past his teeth into his mouth. She was kissing him with hunger and desire. She tasted sweet and salty at the same time as being soft and aggressive. He ground his hips against hers and she whimpered as she continued to massage his tongue with hers.

He needed to have her but they had three more floors before they got to her room. He felt frantic and impatient from a few kisses. He missed her and wanted to have her completely. He couldn’t be satisfied with something like this from her if she came to her senses and remembered why she called it off and all the garbage they put each other through.

His hand moved from her narrow waist and down her backside. He squeezed her cheek firmly and she whimpered again. He moved his hand along the front of her thigh and pushed his thumb against the centre of her jeans. She bucked against his hand as the elevator car came to a stop.

The doors slowly opened and the reality they might have an audience donned on them simultaneously. He stepped back and she put a hand across her mouth as he adjusted himself. He pushed her bag towards her on the floor with his foot.

Much to his relief, the hallway was empty.

Gillian leaned down and grabbed her bag. She took a step off the elevator and turned to him. “Well? Are you coming?”

David grinned at her and wiped his finger across his lips. “Sure.”

 


End file.
